


The Study of Wild Things

by aeli_kindara



Series: Scaffolding 'Verse [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Lyall Lupin's A+ Parenting, Marauders, Marauders' Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-16
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-02-15 18:00:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,443
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13036455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aeli_kindara/pseuds/aeli_kindara
Summary: Sirius figures out Remus's secret.





	The Study of Wild Things

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sort of a prequel to a Remus/Sirius fic I've got mostly written, plus some other random R/S offshoots, but I figured I'd publish this one first.
> 
> I'm warning for violence mostly because I'm also giving this fic an overall G rating — lycanthropy's not pretty, folks. Also a warning for family dysfunction/abuse, which I'll explain more in the end notes.

Remus J. Lupin bothered Sirius.

It wasn’t anything he could pin down, exactly, but from that first day, Sirius had decided to hate him. The other boy was so _timid_ , so devoted to his studying, so… square. That very first evening, Sirius had insulted his nose, and Remus had apologized _. Apologized._ Like he really would change his nose to better fit Sirius’s aesthetic requirements, if only he could.

But… it wasn’t all that, at least not on its own. Peter was timid too, in some of the same ways, and that never particularly annoyed Sirius. Of course, Peter was also devoted, from the very start — to him and to James, though especially to James. Maybe that was the difference. Peter _needed_ them. He was desperate for approval, for inclusion. Remus seemed perfectly resigned to live without it.

When Sirius was being honest, he recognized he had been something of a prat that first week or so. He’d fought with his mother the day he left for Hogwarts, and had stewed in fury for the entire journey. By the time the Sorting Hat on his head, he was thinking to himself, _Maybe I’ll end up in_ Gryffindor _, that’d show them —_

He hadn’t meant anything by it, really. But then, to his horror, the hat had whispered in his ear: _Gryffindor, eh? You’ve got the guts for it. It’s been many a year since we’ve had a Black in…_ “GRYFFINDOR!”

Sirius had been aghast, trying to stop the professor from removing the hat from his head, to argue with it. _No, you’re confused, I’m a Slytherin, Blacks are ALWAYS Slytherins, I didn’t mean it, you stupid hat!_

But that was that. Cissy sneered at him as she made her way to the Slytherin table, moments later, malice glittering in her eyes: _Just wait until I tell auntie on you, little cousin._ He could practically see her composing the owl in her head.

He was the first boy to be sent to the Gryffindor table. Lupin was the second — mousy little half-blood from a no-name family. Sirius had seen him on the train, with a forgotten bar of chocolate melting a stain in his trousers, and his lip curled. Lupin took one look at him, and then stared fixedly down at his plate, not making conversation. Good.

Pettigrew came after that, a decently respectable pureblood, and his wide-eyed adoration was at least a little gratifying, though Sirius was beginning to despair that he’d be sharing seven years of his life with inconsequential morons. Not like Slytherin. Everyone who was anyone went to Slytherin.

His despair was nearing terminal levels when _Potter, James_ was called to the stool, and the hat barely touched his head at all before shrieking out, “GRYFFINDOR!”

Well. At least there was that. He didn’t know Potter _well_ , but his family was as pure as they came, despite a few eccentricities. And they’d played Quidditch together a few times. The other boy was an excellent flier.

\---

Over the next few days, as far as Sirius was concerned, a tight trio formed: himself and James, the natural leaders, and Peter, their little gopher. James didn’t seem to see it _quite_ the same way, which annoyed Sirius at first, but — well, the Potters were eccentric. And James might have funny notions about respect and human dignity and inclusion, but he had excellent notions about pranks.

It was only later that Sirius would realize how lucky he’d gotten. How completely insufferable he’d been, that first week, picking on Lupin and Pettigrew at every opportunity, every bit the cold, snide, pureblooded bastard. That James hadn’t ostracized him for it was a mark of James’s character, not his own. James had seen the hurt, lonely, angry kid underneath, and gave him a chance to drop the act. Eventually, he had.

They’d ultimately folded Lupin — Remus — into their little circle as well, and that was James’s doing, too. It had been a whispered argument between them, late one night, preparing for a prank. _Look,_ James had said, _he’s always got his nose in a book, I bet he’d be good at doing the research. Besides, he lives with us, would you rather he snitch to the teachers or be part of the gang? Come on, Sirius. You should ask him._

So Sirius had, grudgingly, and Remus, looking a little startled, had complied. And from then on, he was one of the four. Sirius had gotten used to it.

Still, something bothered him. Completely apart from Remus’s quiet acceptance of the whims of his more mercurial dormmates… or was it? Remus was _quiet_ , that was the thing. He never talked much, and _never_ about himself, about his family, how his holidays had gone.

And then there were the times he disappeared.

It took Sirius a while to notice it, at first, because he made a habit of not noticing things that were beneath him. But as time passed, it became harder and harder to ignore. There were nights when Remus simply wasn’t in his bed — not often, but enough to seem like a pattern. Most of the time, he’d be there in their first class, looking maybe a little pale but no different from always. Other times, he’d be gone all morning, or every once in a while, all day. And yet he always showed up again by the next night, and if anyone asked him where he’d been, he’d give a vague “around” and curl up in his bed and ignore them all.

Sirius tried to bring it up with James, but James had only grinned and said “maybe he has a _girlfriend_ ” and Peter had guffawed and Sirius had glared at them both in disgust. It was true that Remus had developed a certain odd mystique about him, ever since Sirius had stolen that bottle of Firewhiskey. The rest of them had made complete asses out of themselves and woken up feeling like they’d been run over by the Hogwarts Express. Remus had put away at _least_ as much as he had — Sirius had been watching — and yet he’d remained as composed as ever and woken up in the morning apparently fine, not quite concealing his amusement at his woebegotten friends. 

When Sirius had demanded an explanation, he’d just shrugged and said something like _maybe I’ve got a fast metabolism_ , and since then it had been a running joke. When a girl liked Remus — and girls _did_ like Remus, it was weird, Sirius couldn’t understand it — one of them would break out the “She just wants to get her hands on your metabolism!” and they would all fall over laughing. Remus would look embarrassed and maybe, as much as he tried to hide it, just a little pleased.

\---

It was in second year that Sirius started keeping track.

If any of the others had seen the little notebook, they would have laughed their heads off at him, accused him of keeping a diary like a girl. It wasn’t _that_ , of course. It was just, Remus had a secret, damn it, and even if he _was_ one of them, secrets were still not on. Sirius intended to figure it out.

It was also the fact that something had changed over the summer. Remus, to everyone’s horror, seemed to have hit puberty before the rest of them, and was acutely embarrassed to be growing at an absurd rate with his voice cracking all over the place. But there were other things Sirius noticed, things that gave him an odd feeling in his chest he tried to ignore. Remus was _tired_ a lot, with dark circles under his eyes, and sometimes his attention even wandered in class, which was unheard of. And those nights of absence were rarely just nights anymore. More often than not, Remus would miss at least the morning’s worth of classes, and he’d move around the rest of the day like he’d been hit by a bludger. A dozen bludgers.

It was shortly after Christmas break, their second year, that Remus went missing for two nights in a row. The second morning, when he yet again failed to show up for Potions, even James and Peter looked worried, and Sirius — well, he was worried, fine, but being Sirius, he was more _angry_ than anything. And so when Snivellus made some snide comment about Sirius’s little friend, Sirius attacked.

They both ended up in the Hospital Wing — Snape for reversal of a Bat Bogey Hex, and Sirius to deal with his teeth, which had grown past his chin under the influence of Snape’s curse. Madam Pomfrey, looking harried, dealt with Snape first and sent him on his way, then moved on to the delicate business of shrinking Sirius’s teeth down to size. The process _hurt_ — teeth didn’t seem to enjoy being rearranged on a moment’s notice — and when she was done, his eyes were stinging despite himself. Pomfrey gave him a mortifyingly sympathetic look and told him she’d go get a nice potion to make the ache go away.

Sirius was sitting there on the edge of an infirmary bed, furious and humiliated, when he noticed the door.

It was the one Pomfrey had come out of, when he and Snape had first been dragged into the Hospital Wing, and at the time he’d thought nothing of it. But the door now was slightly ajar, and through it he could see — another bed?

Curious, he tiptoed across the room, glancing back to confirm that Pomfrey was nowhere to be seen. Slowly, ever so slowly, he eased open the door.

It was a spartan little hospital room, barely big enough for the bed it contained. And curled in the bed, fast asleep, was Remus Lupin.

He looked _awful._ There was a huge purple bruise on one side of his face, oozing a little dark blood through broken skin, and his arm — his arm was in a _cast_. People never used casts in the wizarding world, except for really complicated breaks where the bone regrowing process would take a day or more and require physical guidance. Sirius stared. Remus’s face twitched a little in his sleep, tightened.

For a moment, Sirius wanted to rush forward, to shake his friend awake and ask him what in the hell had happened to him. Then he heard a noise from Pomfrey’s storeroom and fled back to his own bed.

It was only later that he would realize this was the first time he had consciously thought of Remus Lupin as his friend _._

\---

He told James and Peter about it, of course. Peter seemed both horrified and fascinated — _maybe he’s in a fight club!_ — and James didn’t say much at all, except to shut Sirius down as soon as he suggested confronting Remus. “No,” James said. “If he wanted to tell us, he would have, right? We won’t make him trust us by hounding him about it.”

So Sirius kept his mouth shut. Except — well, they hadn’t _been_ there, hadn’t seen how awful Remus truly looked. He showed up later that afternoon, looking drawn and pale but with no trace of the bruise Sirius had seen that morning. As always, he vaguely dismissed their queries as to his whereabouts, and at James’s warning look, all three of them left well enough alone. But it didn’t stop preying on Sirius’s mind.

The next day, he started the journal.

It wasn’t hard, really, to remember the days Remus had been gone. He’d missed that fantastic prank involving the Slytherins and flashing neon underpants — that had been October 4th, the day before a Potions test. And he’d missed Sirius’s Transfiguration presentation, on December 2nd. But there’d been another time, in between — with some care, Sirius worked it out. November 2nd, two days after Halloween.

Once a month, roughly. Remus’s most recent disappearance had been on January 30th, but there could have been another — something like it — over Christmas Break. Whatever _it_ was.

Sirius stared at his calendar in exasperation. What earthly reason would Remus Lupin have to disappear once a month, and come back with horrific injuries? Remus was so — _boring._ Straight-laced. The least exciting boy Sirius knew.

He sighed, and put away the journal.

\---

It was a few weeks later that it hit him.

It was during their Astronomy class. Once a month, in the week surrounding the New Moon, Astronomy classes would meet at night — the conditions were best for observing the stars when there was no moonlight to interfere. Sirius had always liked those classes, the late night observing sessions, mapping the stars and sneaking up on girls to put crickets in their hair. The dark of night was a good cover for pranks. The four of them used it well.

What Sirius hadn’t realized was that Remus was there. _Always_. There, and smiling, and giving as good as he got, with no trace of the stiffness or distance that Sirius had come to associate with him. Remus had missed a lot of classes, and a lot of pranks. Why never these ones?

It was a few days before Sirius had privacy. When he did, though, he pulled out his chart of the moon’s phases — also an Astronomy project, and one that James and Peter had scribbled lewd notes all over, and Sirius realized with a growing horror that Remus had missed this assignment, too — and set it next to his journal.

October 4th, full moon. November 2nd, full moon. December 2nd, full moon. January 30th, full moon.

His stomach tightening, Sirius drew his finger down to the next date on the chart.

February 29th, full moon.

\---

Leap Day dawned bright and clear, with Remus distant and abstracted. It was after he nearly singed his eyebrows off in potions and barely reacted that Sirius gave James a significant look and jerked his head, subtly as he could, to the hallway.

James found him after class, ducking into an alcove out of view of the rush of students moving toward the Great Hall for lunch. “What’s up?”

“I think he’s going to disappear again tonight,” Sirius replied in a low voice, not bothering to specify who he meant.

James’s brow knitted. “How do you know?”

Sirius paused, then shook his head. “I’ll tell you if I’m right. We should get to lunch, they’ll wonder where we are.”

James nodded, and led the way without another word.

\---

By dinner, Remus was gone. He’d slipped away sometime after Charms — the boy was damnably good at disappearing, Sirius hadn’t even noticed him go. Sirius and James traded a significant glance, which Peter caught. “What is it?” he asked, eyebrows raised.

“After dinner,” James murmured.

When they were finally alone, the door locked and wedged shut with a chair, Sirius exhaled deeply. He had already checked Remus’s bed, in case he’d just been feeling poorly and skipped dinner, but no one was there. The bed was neatly made, as always.

“All right,” he said. “Er.” It was not like him to be at a loss for words.

James glanced at Peter. “Sirius thinks he knows why Remus disappears sometimes.”

Sirius found himself feeling a little ill. It wasn’t that he regretted sharing his hypothesis with James and Peter — it was just the _manner_ of it. It felt accusatory.

“Um,” he said, and went to open the locked drawer in his trunk. There were two things inside: the journal he’d been keeping track of Remus’s disappearances in, and the moon chart. Wordlessly, he passed them to James.

“ _Oh_ ,” said James, the moment he glanced at the objects in his hands.

“What?” asked Peter, bouncing on the balls of his feet to get a better look.

James passed them to him, but his eyes were on Sirius as he spoke. His tone was guarded and unreadable. “Sirius," he said, "thinks Remus is a werewolf.”

Predictably, Peter gasped. It came out half as a squeak. "Are you _sure_?"

"No," snapped Sirius. "I'm not. But I wanted to find out, after I saw him in the Hospital Wing, so I started charting his disappearances, and this is what I found. It's on a full moon. It's _always_ on a full moon."

Peter's mouth formed a small O of shock, but no sound emerged.

"Where d'you think he goes?" asked James.

Sirius shook his head. "I don't know. Somewhere safe, I guess. Maybe he goes home, his parents must..." He trailed off, remembering how little Remus spoke of home.

"Do you think the teachers know?" Peter asked.

"They must," said James, "if he's going to the Hospital Wing after. Unless you think that was a one-time thing?"

"I don't know," said Sirius, biting his lip.

"We could find out," Peter suggested. "We have the invisibility cloak. We could break in and be there in the morning when he... When he comes in."

\---

They spent most of the night planning. It wasn’t hard to break into the Hospital Wing, really; it was just that all three of them were on edge and unwilling to admit it.

Finally, around three in the morning, Peter glanced around at them and said, “Well, why don’t we just go, shall we?”

It had been a strange night, all around; stranger still that Peter was taking the lead. Before he could start down the stairs after him, James caught Sirius’s elbow.

“Are you going to be a prick about this?” he asked in a low voice.

Sirius wrenched his arm away with a scowl. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Look, I —” James ran a hand through his already disheveled hair. “I know you don’t like him that much. I mean, that’s why you’ve been trying to uncover his secret, right? But he’s _ours_ , Sirius. If you’re planning on using this to hurt him… you should know I won’t let you.”

It surprised him how much the words stung. He glared at James and started down the stairs without another word.

\---

Breaking into the Hospital Wing turned out to be easy — a simple _Alohomora_ had done the trick. They’d relocked the door and found an unobtrusive corner to lurk under the cloak. The three of them could fit under it fairly comfortably, though four had gotten difficult with Remus’s recent growth spurt. Before long, both James and Peter had drifted into fitful sleep.

Sirius couldn’t quite follow them. It was partly that he felt one of them should stay alert. But it was partly watching the full moon, sinking in its slow arc past the infirmary windows. His thoughts wouldn’t leave him alone. He’d read a good deal about lycanthropy, over the last few weeks, hiding the books in his trunk when anyone was looking. What he’d learned wasn’t pretty. Some sources described werewolves as creatures of darkness, evil in whatever form they took; this, Sirius knew, was horseshit. But others painted portraits of ordinary men under the tyranny of the beast that lurked inside. The two bore no relation to each other; on the night of the full moon, the man in question had no power at all. He underwent a painful transformation into a murderous, reasonless monster.

One of the books Sirius had found went into particular detail about the transformation. The author, a rather self-important dark creature hunter, had killed a werewolf halfway through its transition in order to dissect it. Several pages described the author’s other encounters with werewolves — the way their screams turned to howls as they shifted, the stories the men told of the horror of transforming into a beast. His anatomical discussions were worse still: of bones cracking and stretching, muscles and tendons popping into place. _Quite unlike that of the Animagus, which is a metaphysical transformation,_ the author had written, _the werewolf’s transformation is purely of the flesh. Physical objects such as clothing or wands will be lost or destroyed in the process, as the body remakes itself into a new shape._

There had been diagrams, and detailed notes. There had been a long discussion of the best methods for killing a werewolf. Sirius had thrown up three times in the bathroom, and never gone back to that book.

Perhaps that was why James’s accusation had stung so deeply. Because James didn’t _know_ — he hadn’t read these books. He hadn’t been there to see Remus, that morning in the Hospital Wing. He didn’t know _._

\---

Sirius drifted off eventually, after all, and it was James who woke him with a hand over his mouth in the early morning light. There were sounds from outside the room — low voices conversing, and a gentle thump.

By the time the doorknob turned, the three of them were on their feet and well covered in the cloak. As one, they drifted forward on silent feet.

Madam Pomfrey was first into the room, her face lined with worry. Behind her came the Headmaster, wand out, and in front of him floated a stretcher.

It took Sirius half a heartbeat to even recognize Remus. He lay there limp and unconscious — and absolutely covered in blood. His left leg was at a strange angle that sent a dizzying swoop through Sirius’s stomach, and something looked wrong about his right wrist, too. Beside him, Sirius heard Peter choke down a tiny cry of dismay. Without thinking, he squeezed his friend’s shoulder — warning, but reassurance, too.

Dumbledore and Pomfrey disappeared into the small room Sirius had seen before. After a glance, the three Marauders hurried quietly forward. They could not see what was going on inside, but at least they could hear it.

“I don’t know how much more of this he can take, Albus,” Madam Pomfrey was saying. “It’s worse every time. Isn’t there something you can do, some kind of accommodations —”

“We’ve done as well as we can, Poppy,” Dumbledore replied in a grave, quiet voice.

A pause, and the sound of water running. “I know. But, Albus — if it keeps going like this, one of these mornings I’m going to go down there and find a body. It wasn’t this bad, last year.”

Dumbledore sighed. “I know. And I had hoped things would — ease, soon. Last year, Remus was merely a boy, and the wolf little more than a puppy. Now…” He trailed off, almost at a loss for words. “Adolescence is difficult for any child, but the wolf is growing, too. And I fear that whatever emotions Remus is experiencing — stress, anxiety, loneliness — are only amplified during the transformation. I had hoped…”

He didn’t finish the sentence, though, and after a moment, he sighed. “Poppy, I must leave you to your task. You will be all right?”

Madam Pomfrey’s voice had a slight quaver in it that she couldn’t quite conceal. “Yes, Headmaster, thank you.”

The Marauders barely had time to get clear of the door before it swung open and Dumbledore stepped out. For a heart-stopping instant, he paused, and his eyes seemed to rest squarely on Sirius. But then he was striding away again, the door latched firmly behind him.

For a moment, the three of them merely stared at each other.

“ _Merlin_ ,” James whispered finally. His breath was hot on Sirius’s cheek — they were too close, here in the confines of the cloak. But Sirius barely noticed. His mind was reeling. For all he’d known what to expect…

“How did that _happen_ ?” Peter asked in a terrified whisper. “I thought werewolves turned _into_ wolves, I didn’t think they got mauled by them!”

“It’s not a voluntary process,” Sirius whispered back, feeling oddly distant from the sound of his own voice. “I read about it some. It’s excruciatingly painful — the whole body has to rearrange itself, and then do it again. And the wolf… it doesn’t understand human reason. If it’s confined, it will spend the whole night trying to batter its way out.”

“And if he’s not confined, he’ll attack someone,” James finished. “Merlin. What do we do?”

“I’m not leaving,” Sirius replied immediately, surprising even himself. “Not until we’re sure he’s okay.”

\---

They waited for what seemed like hours before the door finally opened and Madam Pomfrey bustled out, drying her hands on a clean cloth towel. Removing her blood-spattered apron, she ducked inside her office, then emerged again and moved toward the Hospital Wing exit.

A heartbeat passed as the door swung closed. Another. A third.

As one, the Marauders moved for the little room.

The doorknob turned easily under James’s hand. They were all inside and the door shut behind them before they slipped out of the invisibility cloak.

Remus was asleep in the hospital bed. He didn’t look nearly as bad as he had when he’d arrived — the blood had been cleaned up, revealing scrapes and bruises that even now seemed to be fading under the gentle glow of a healing potion. The leg that had been at such an odd angle seemed to be right again, though Remus’s wrist was immobilized in an unwieldy-looking splint. His face had a tight, pinched look to it, and was white beneath his wounds.

“What now?” Peter whispered, glancing at the other two.

“I — don’t know,” Sirius answered. “Maybe we should leave.”

“Aren’t we going to _talk_ to him?”

“Later,” James said. “He doesn’t need to deal with us, not now. We can talk to him… when he’s feeling better.”

But it was too late. Remus, damn him — was it a werewolf thing, his sharp hearing? — was stirring in bed. “Sirius?”

The word came out as a cracked whisper. Remus blinked once, then again, blearily, his eyes seeming to struggle to focus. Then his face seemed to grow even whiter. “Oh, God,” he said. “Oh, God. You _know_.”

The three of them stood frozen. _Do something,_ Sirius tried to tell himself, but his body would not respond. _Say something._

It was James who took a half-step forward. “Mate —”

“Please,” whispered Remus, eyes falling shut again, voice rough with pain. “Please, can you just give me — a day? I’ll go. You don’t ever have to see me again. Just — a day, before you tell the whole school?”

James opened his mouth again, but Sirius was faster. “Don’t be a bloody _idiot_ , Lupin!” he exploded in a fierce whisper. “We’re not —”

Just then, the sound of footsteps came, approaching Remus’s door. The Marauders exchanged one glance and dived under the bed, James whirling the cloak out to cover them just in time.

It was Madam Pomfrey again. “Remus,” she said kindly. “You’re awake. I’m sorry, but I’m afraid we’re not done yet — we’re going to need to do something about that wrist, and finish up on the leg.”

There was an instant of hesitation. “All right,” came Remus’s soft reply.

“You’re a good lad,” Pomfrey told him, the fondness and sorrow evident in her tone. “I’m sorry I can’t give you anything for the pain. I can sedate you if you want me to.”

“It’s all right,” said Remus again.

Madam Pomfrey sighed. “We’ll start with the leg, then. I’ve already realigned it, we just need to get the healing process started. Are you ready?”

No response, but Remus must have nodded, because Pomfrey began muttering a complex incantation. Remus gave a choked cry, then was silent. There was a grinding, crackling noise from above them, and James and Peter’s eyes met in horror.

“All right,” said Madam Pomfrey after a minute, “that’s done.”

Remus sucked in a harsh breath, then let it out again. “Thank you,” he whispered.

“Are you ready for the wrist,” Pomfrey asked kindly, “or should I give you a minute?”

“No, I —” Remus paused. “I’m ready.”

“This will take longer,” Pomfrey said, “but should not be quite as painful. You’ve fractured several of the small bones in your wrist, as well as your ulna, but none of them as badly as the leg.”

“Carpals,” Remus murmured.

Pomfrey gave a small laugh. “Yes, the carpals. There’s some tendon strain, too, of course, but I can ease that once the bones are back in place. Are you ready?”

“Yes.”

More incantations. There was no crying out this time, but Remus’s breath became fast and ragged, his weight shifting slightly on the mattress above them. It _did_ take longer — several minutes dragged by before Pomfrey fell silent and Remus let out a long, controlled breath. “Thank you,” he said again.

Next to Sirius’s head, Pomfrey’s feet shifted. “Well,” she said, “you’re on the mend. I don’t think you should expect to be out for any of your classes today, but we’ll see how things go in the afternoon, shall we? You might be back with your friends for dinner, if all goes well.”

“Right,” Remus said faintly.

“I’ll have the house elves bring you up some breakfast,” Pomfrey continued. “I’ll be back in a little while, all right?”

“Thanks, Madam Pomfrey,” Remus said. Feet moved, and the door swung open, then shut again. They were alone.

\---

“I think you can come out now,” Remus said after a moment, in an unreadable voice.

They emerged in an undignified, partially invisible heap. Peter let out three emphatic sneezes, and while Sirius resisted the urge, he could understand it. It was _dusty_ under there.

Remus was watching them warily. There was sweat on his face that hadn’t been there before, but the splint was off his hand.

“Right,” said James, decisively, taking charge. “Remus, don’t be a lunatic, we’re not going to _tell_ anyone.”

A heartbeat passed as Remus stared at them. “You’re not?”

“Of course we’re not!” Peter squeaked, having finally conquered his sneezing.

“And you’re not going anywhere,” James added, “so stop that crazy talk.”

“I’m not sure,” said Remus faintly. “Do you not understand? I’m a _werewolf._ ”

“Yes, quite,” James returned blandly.

“And you’re not —” Remus gestured with his right hand, then winced as he remembered its recent healing. “You’re crazy. You should be terrified _._ ”

“Well,” said Peter, “you haven’t eaten us in our sleep yet, and I figure if you wanted to, you probably could have.”

Remus stared at him. “Right,” he said faintly.

“Besides,” James added, “don’t take this the wrong way, mate, but you’re just — not very scary. No offense.”

“You’re really not,” Sirius added, because he felt like he should say _something_.

Remus let out a startled laugh, which turned immediately to a cough. He doubled up, coughing harder, and a fine spray of blood dappled the sheet.

“ _Jesus_ , mate,” James said, starting forward. “Are you all right, should we get Pomfrey —”

But Remus had regained control of himself, and leaned back against the pillow, closing his eyes. “I’m fine,” he managed. “Lung contusion, it’s already healing. Don’t get Pomfrey.”

In the distance, a bell rang, and Remus’s eyes flew open. “You need to go to class!”

“Class,” James scoffed. “We can stay here with you instead.”

“No, you should go,” Remus told them, clearly striving to be firm. “They’ll notice if all of us aren’t there. And I’m going to fall asleep in a few minutes and be really boring. You should go.”

The three of them exchanged glances. It _would_ be obvious if all four of them were missing.

“All right,” James decided, “we’ll go. But we’ll be back.”

\---

They were back, though only for a few brief minutes during the lunch break before they had to make a narrow escape from Madam Pomfrey, who had also returned to check on her patient. They tried again, after classes were out, but there was a rush of Potions injuries occupying the infirmary, and no way to sneak through to Remus.

“We’ll try again after dinner,” James decided. They had missed breakfast and most of lunch, and Peter’s stomach growled audibly in response.

“I’ll meet you there,” Sirius told the others. “I need to grab something first.”

It was a lie — he honestly couldn’t imagine eating anything, his stomach had been in turmoil all day — but James and Peter didn’t seem to notice. Sirius still had to dodge a few other groups of Gryffindors making their way to dinner, but was able to smile gamely and fend off requests to join them.

When he finally made it to their dorm room, he shut the door behind him before sliding down against it and burying his face in his arms. He was breathing hard, partly from running up the stairs, but mostly from the storm of unwanted emotions fighting in his chest. There was fear, yes, and anger — anger at Remus for being so goddamned stupid, for keeping this thing to himself and always being so poised and normal and _fine_ , and anger at himself for taking so long to notice, and for not being able to _do_ anything about it, not a damn thing.

And there was — pain. He didn’t know the word for it, not really, just this _pain_ raging inside him. If he’d been older, and known a little more of the world, Sirius might have called it grief.

After several long minutes, Sirius realized he was crying. His face was wet with tears, and he’d been making odd snuffling sounds that he’d be ashamed to admit to anyone. Suddenly self-conscious, he raised his head to look around the empty room, just to make sure no one could possibly have heard.

His eyes met the startled gray gaze of Remus Lupin.

\---

“I’m not crying,” Sirius said, like an idiot.

“Right,” said Remus carefully. “I didn’t think you were.”

He was curled on his own bed, half propped up on one elbow, surprise still written across his face. He looked better than he had, the marks gone from his face, though there was still a pinched look about him as if his whole body was in pain.

“They let you out,” said Sirius Black, master of the obvious.

“Yes,” replied Remus Lupin, the obvious’s second-in-command.

After a moment, he added into the awkward silence, “Pomfrey thought I could go to dinner, but I’m not really hungry.”

“Yeah,” said Sirius. “Yeah, me neither.”

“I was thinking about eating some chocolate, though,” Remus added in a small voice. Then, after a pause: “You could have some. If you like.”

They regarded each other for a minute, and Sirius suddenly had the odd sense that _he_ was the wild beast in the room, and that the werewolf in the four-poster bed was trying, incongruously enough, to gentle him.

“Yeah,” he said again. “Yeah, all right.”

Remus’s lips twitched in what just might have been a smile. Gingerly, he levered himself upright, and began to reach for his trunk. “ _Ah_ ,” he said, wincing with pain, and tried again.

Sirius was on his feet in an instant. “I’ve got it,” he said quickly.

“There’s a box in my trunk,” Remus said. “Should be obvious… grab one of the dark ones, will you?”

Sirius found the box and opened it. Inside was a small stash of chocolate bars — mostly cheap stuff, but there were a few bars of dark chocolate, nicely wrapped in gold foil, and clearly of higher quality. Sirius removed one of those and passed it to Remus, who had inexpertly arranged his pillows so that he could sit up in bed. One of them was already sagging precariously, and Sirius quashed the urge to adjust it. Remus snapped the chocolate bar in half, passing one half to Sirius, and took a small bite from the other, eyes sliding closed. The look on his face was that of a dying man who has just found water in the desert.

Sirius took a bite of his own. It _was_ good chocolate. Still, he didn’t have the reaction to it that Remus seemed to — as if the chocolate was all that mattered in the world, as if it alone could hold together his soul.

“You really like chocolate, don’t you,” Sirius said.

“Yeah,” said Remus distantly, taking another tiny bite. “It’s — _mm._ Especially dark chocolate.”

“Why don’t you just get dark chocolate, then?” Sirius asked, curious. “If you like it better.”

Remus’s eyes opened again, regarding him a little warily.

“Oh,” said Sirius, “I’m an idiot.” Remus had never _said_ that he was poor, but it was obvious enough, from his frayed clothes and second-hand textbooks. Sirius almost wanted to hand back his chocolate — if this was one of Remus’s three precious bars of dark chocolate, if they meant _that much_ to him. But no, that would be stupid. He’d sneak out to Hogsmeade next weekend and buy Remus a barrel of dark chocolate, see if he wouldn’t.

Remus either accepted this, or was too tired — and too involved in his chocolate — to answer. He took another tiny nibble, rolling it in his mouth before chewing. Sirius found himself watching in fascination. The bruises on Remus’s jaw _weren’t_ gone, completely — they were partly healed, but partly under some kind of concealment charm. You could tell, by the way the light shifted on his jaw, just a little off.

“Do you do the charms yourself?” he asked abruptly. “To hide it, I mean?”

Remus opened his eyes and studied him for a moment. “Pomfrey helps sometimes,” he answered finally, “but mostly I do them myself. They’re one of the first charms my mum made me learn, when I got my textbooks. I’m pretty good at them.”

“They’re really good,” agreed Sirius, who’d occasionally had reason to hide a black eye or two.

“Before that,” Remus added, with a quirk to his lips like he was telling a horrible secret, “she’d use _makeup_ on me, sometimes. I hated that.”

“Why not just spell them herself?” Sirius asked, absently. He was oddly distracted by the smudge of chocolate at the corner of Remus's mouth.

Remus’s expression closed off a bit, as if he’d suddenly realized he’d exposed himself too much. “My mum’s not a witch,” he said.

“Right, but your dad’s magical, isn’t he? Couldn’t he —” Sirius stopped. There was a stillness about Remus, like a wild animal caught in the instant before flight. There was so much here that he didn’t see. “You and your dad don’t get on well, do you.”

Remus watched him for a long minute, silent. There was something behind his eyes, though, something that wanted to get out.

“Say it,” Sirius whispered, feeling sick.

Remus looked down. His voice, when he spoke, was level. “He thinks I should be put down. My mum wouldn’t allow it.”

It took a moment for the full impact of his words to hit. Sirius gaped, then swore violently, leaping to his feet. He could feel his body shaking as he looked down at Remus, who was looking back at him with that calm, guarded expression. “ _Fuck,_ ” Sirius said again, loudly. He turned away, pacing across the room, started back, turned away again. He stood for a moment, facing the rough stone wall, then punched it with all his might.

“Don’t be an idiot,” Remus snapped, and when Sirius turned back around he was standing, swaying a little on his feet. He moved quickly across the room, though. His fingers were firm but gentle on Sirius’s hand. It was stinging, distantly, but Sirius couldn’t really care past the roaring in his ears. His knuckles were bleeding. Remus ran his fingers gently over the joints of Sirius’s hand, then muttered a spell, and the bleeding stopped.

“You didn’t break anything,” Remus told him, releasing his hand, “though you deserve to. That was stupid.”

“I’m stupid?” Sirius demanded. “ _I’m_ stupid? You —” he cut himself short, furious, and realized to his horror that he was crying again.

“Sh,” said Remus, gently. “It’s all right. Things are all right now. Come on, there’s more chocolate.”

Sirius let Remus lead him back to the bed, still shaking. When James and Peter got back, an hour later, both boys were curled on Remus’s bed, surrounded by fragments of gold foil and sleeping like the dead.

\---

Slowly, the Marauders began to settle into the pattern of their newfound understanding.

It might have been different, had they not found out how they did. There might have been a distance, and a fear. But none of them could have seen that bloody boy on the stretcher, heard the heartbreak in Remus’s voice as he begged them for one day, and remained aloof. The wolf might be a dark creature, but _Remus_ wasn’t.

Instead, there seemed to be an unspoken understanding between the three of them: Remus was _theirs_ , and they would defend him at any cost. Sirius was perhaps the most fiercely protective, but all three of them clustered closer around him as the next full moon approached, chasing away his bleak silences with laughter.

Remus sternly forbade them to wait in the Hospital Wing again, and after some consideration, James backed him up — _You know, he’s right, it might not be too noticeable if he disappears once a month, but it definitely would be if all of us did_ — but Sirius still got up before the others, snagged James’s invisibilty cloak, and went to lurk in the hallway outside the Hospital Wing. He didn’t have long to wait before Madam Pomfrey appeared from the other end of the hall. Leaning heavily on her right arm, battered and limping but walking under his own power, was Remus.

Madam Pomfrey had a barely disguised expression of relief on her face. Sirius held it like a warmth in his chest as he hurried back to the Gryffindor tower.

\---

Remus was missing from breakfast that morning, but slipped into their first class — Charms — just as the bell was ringing. James gave him a delighted grin, and Peter flashed a quick thumbs up. Remus looked wan and tired, and Sirius could see the subtle signs of a concealment charm across his left temple, but he returned their smiles and began to dig in his bag for a piece of parchment. As he did, his fingers brushed the bar of chocolate Sirius had slipped in there moments before, and he glanced up, startled. Sirius merely raised his eyebrows, and Remus gave another smile before extracting his quill and beginning to scribble. 

“Where do you go for it?” Peter asked that night, the four of them all sitting on the floor around a meal purloined from the kitchens. Remus had nibbled at some of it, not looking very hungry, but clearly making an effort.

They hadn’t really talked about it much, since that first day. There wasn’t much to say — or rather, there was _too_ much to say, and to be asked, and they were adolescent boys and not exactly prone to talking about their feelings. Sirius hadn’t even told James what Remus had said, that night with the chocolate, though he’d kept his fury locked tight in his heart.

“Well,” said Remus, after the briefest of hesitations, “have you heard of the Shrieking Shack?”

Peter shook his head, but James nodded. “It’s an old abandoned house outside Hogsmeade. It’s supposed to be haunted. There’s no way in or out, Sirius and I tried one time.”

Remus looked faintly amused. “Well, there _is_ a way in. A secret passageway, from Hogwarts.”

Peter’s jaw dropped, and James said, “ _No._ Mate, that’s awesome, you have to show us.”

\---

It was about a week before Remus could be persuaded to show them the Shrieking Shack. It seemed to Sirius that he was a little reluctant, and that perhaps they should stop pushing him on it, but… well, he was curious too, and Remus’s discomfort seemed to be paired with a squirming, helpless pleasure at his friends’ interest. So it was that late one night, clustered under the invisibility cloak, Remus led them out of the castle and across Hogwarts grounds toward the Whomping Willow.

“Careful around that thing,” James cautioned, as they got close. “It almost took my eye out once, we should maybe give it a wider berth.”

Remus gave them an enigmatic smile and bent down to pick up a rock from the ground. Frowning in concentration, he muttered, “ _Wingardium leviosa_ ,” and sent the rock gliding slowly through the branches of the willow, which stirred ominously but did not respond. In the dark, Sirius could not see quite what Remus was doing, but then he twitched his wand, and there was a small _thunk_ , and the willow froze.

Remus ducked out from under the cloak and led the way, apparently fearlessly, through the motionless branches of the tree.

For a moment, the three others were frozen. Then James said, “Well, come on, then,” and they hurried after him. There was something eerie about it, winding their way between the branches of a murderous tree in the light of a half moon. When they reached the trunk, Remus was waiting for them.

He led them down a hole between the tree’s roots and into a dark passageway. Sirius’s nostrils flared, taking in the scent of damp and a whiff of old blood. They had to duck under tree roots as they made their way downward, none of them speaking.

At last, Remus came to a stop before a solid wooden door. He seemed to hesitate.

“Aren’t we going in?” Peter asked.

“There’s not much to see —” Remus started, but James had already turned the knob, and led the way up the wooden staircase.

There was another door at the top, which wouldn’t budge, even when James tried a whispered _Alohomora_. Remus sighed, bent over the knob, and muttered something too soft for the others to catch. The knob clicked as he turned it, and the door swung open.

This door was twice as thick as the one at the bottom of the stairs. It was old, like the rest of the house, but reinforced with thick layers of new wood. Turning back as they passed through it, Sirius saw that this side of the door was marred with deep gouges.

So was the rest of the room. Floors, old furniture — the upholstery hung in ribbons. Dark stains on the floorboards looked suspiciously like blood.

“I’m sorry,” said Remus, in a distant, funny voice. “I should have cleaned the place up.”

The others said nothing, apparently struck dumb, so it was Sirius who drawled, “Yeah, we were really looking for a nice place for a spot of tea, not a werewolf’s lair, you ninny,” and then they were all laughing. Perhaps a little too hard, but — it was a start.

At their insistence, Remus showed them around; showed them the cabinet upstairs where he hid his clothes and wand so he could retrieve them later and let himself out again. If he was awake to let himself out. If not, Madam Pomfrey came down to find him, though she always gave sunrise a good berth, just in case.

There was an upstairs bedroom that had gone largely untouched, and moonlight even shafted into the room through gaps in the boarded up window. Sirius plopped down in one of the patches of light, and after a moment, the rest of them followed suit. “I like it,” he declared. “The Shrieking Shack. When we are evil geniuses, can this be our secret base?”

“Definitely,” James replied, yawning as he stretched out on the floor. “We will make all our evil plans here, and no one will ever find us.”

“Anytime but the full moon,” Remus muttered, following suit.

\---

They must have fallen asleep, because it was much later when Sirius awoke, face on the rough wood floor and sunlight streaming in through the gaps in the boards. He blinked against it. Today was Saturday, with nothing to do and nowhere to be; he could almost fall asleep again, if only he could get comfortable on these boards…

He turned over on his back, and as he did, saw Remus sitting up, watching him.

“Morning,” he said softly, glancing around at the others — both still asleep. Remus nodded in response, apparently contemplating the wall.

At length, he said, “I am, you know. Scary.”

Sirius propped himself up on both elbows. “Pardon?”

“You and James said I wasn’t. But I am.”

“Oh, that.” Sirius lay back again. “Yeah, I guess you are.”

“Doesn’t that bother you?” Remus asked softly.

Sirius turned on his side, in order to better observe his friend. “No. I like dragons, and dragons are _way_ scarier than you. Dragons are scary every day of the year. You’ve got nothing on dragons.”

That startled a laugh out of him, which gave Sirius a little thrill of warmth completely independent of the patch of sunlight he was lying in. “I suppose you’re right.”

“I know I’m right,” Sirius declared, yawning extravagantly. “Now stop worrying and go back to sleep.”

Remus sighed. “It is morning. Some people would find this a perfectly acceptable hour to get up. Do things. Study.”

“It’s true,” Sirius admitted, squinting past the pillow of his arm. “And very tragic. That’s why it’s good you’re friends with us.”

Remus peered at him skeptically. “If you say so.”

“I know so. It will be a sad day when any friend of mine gets away with being strictly diurnal.” He considered. “And that goes double for friends who are also creatures of darkness.”

Remus laughed.

It started as just a little giggle. But when Remus took another breath, what emerged was a mighty snort of laughter, making the both of them jump. And then Remus was gone — shaking with it, eyes watering, doubled over on himself, laughing like Sirius had never seen him laugh before. Peter stirred and groaned, and James rolled over to face the wall, muttering vaguely, “Wassit?”

“Nothing,” Remus gasped. “Nothing, just —” And he was off again, shaking with nearly soundless mirth.

“Mate,” said James, turning over again and blinking owlishly.

“Nothing,” repeated Remus, seizing the reins at last. “Go back to sleep. We’re nocturnal creatures. Sirius decided.”

He slid back down to the floor himself, decisively, and turned on his side, closing his eyes. James blinked again and mumbled something incoherent, and Peter let out a loud snore.

“Okay,” muttered James. “Fine. Whatever.” And he turned over one last time, leaving Sirius the only one watching.

Remus was smiling, just a little. His hand, where it pillowed his face, covered a faint scratch in the wood of the floorboards. A matching line ran across Remus’s face, faint but detectable in the sunlight. His smile pulled it into a new shape. He exhaled deeply and shifted further into the floor.

Sirius just watched as his friend slipped away into sleep, feeling obscurely like the winner of something immense.

What it was, he didn’t know, or where he would put it, or what he would do with it tomorrow. But watching his friend’s face — seeing that smile linger, long into sleep — he simply knew he wouldn’t trade it for every galleon in the world.

**Author's Note:**

> In this universe, Remus's father doesn't respond well to his son's lycanthropy; he believes Remus should be euthanized. This concept is explored more in other fics in this series.


End file.
